• by Erik Sass  @eriksass1, April 27, 2009

The latest figures from the Audit Bureau of Circulations held neither surprises or good news for newspapers, which experienced another big drop in circulation between the six-month period ending March 2008 and the comparable period ending March 2009.

Daily weekday circulation at the 100 largest newspapers dropped a total of 7.5% -- from a total 26.56 million to 24.59 million, according to MediaPost's analysis of the ABC figures, with far larger percentage drops at some individual titles.

Among national newspapers and big metro dailies, USA Today's daily circulation fell 7.5% to 2,113,725; the New York Post plunged 20.6% to 558,140, while its rival the New York Daily News tumbled 14.3% to 602,857; The New York Times posted a modest 3.4% decline to 1,039,031; The Los Angeles Times saw daily circulation fall 6.6% to 723,181; and The Chicago Tribune slipped 7.5% to 501,202. The Wall Street Journal was one of the few newspapers in the country to see daily circulation increase, albeit by just 0.6% to 2,082,189.

Among the big regional dailies, some of the steepest declines in 2008-2009 came at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, where daily circulation tumbled 20% to 261,828; the Boston Herald, down 17.4% to 150,688; the Star-Ledger of Newark, down 17% to 287,082; the San Francisco Chronicle, down 16% to 312,118; The Miami Herald, down 16% to 202,122; the Press-Enterprise of Riverside County, CA, down 15% to 140,079; and the Times Union of Jacksonville, down 15% to 122,655.

In addition, the San Antonio Express News was down 14.5% to 192,930; The Houston Chronicle, down 14% to 425,138; The Boston Globe, down 14% to 302,638; The Philadelphia Inquirer, down 14% to 288,298; The Cleveland Plain Dealer, down 12% to 291,630; The Portland Oregonian, down 12% to 268,512; The Cincinnati Enquirer, down 10.6% to 188,956; the St. Petersburg Times, down 10.5% to 283,093; the South Florida Sun of Fort Lauderdale, down 10.5% to 195,522; the Dallas Morning News, down 10% to 331,907; and The Baltimore Sun, down 9.6% to 210,098.

Looking at the long-term trend, the decade-long decline in print readership has taken a remarkable toll on newspaper circulations. Since March 2002, total circulation at the same 100 newspapers covered in this analysis has dropped 18% from its 2002 level of just under 30 million.

Even more ominous, the rate of decline is clearly accelerating. Of the total decline of 5.4 million from 2002-2009, 11.5% occurred between 2002-2008 -- averaging under 2% a year -- compared to 6.5% in 2008-2009.